September 15, 2008
Morning Roundup: The Great Indoors Edition
Good morning, D.C. It was a rather hot and humid but full weekend for most of you, if the DCist Flickr pool is any indication. Although surely, some of the rest of you must have also avoided going outside and spent the weekend watching the Redskins win, Tiny Fey nail Sarah Palin, and some pretty bad vampire acting. Or was that just us? Looks like it should cool down at least a little bit after today, thank goodness.
Union Station Movie Theater Closing: So The Union Station 9, the worn around the edges movie theater in the basement of the train station, is going to close, and Washington Post Columnist Marc Fisher seems elated by the news. That the theater was located "at the crossroads between the affluent and impoverished parts of town," or in other words, that the crowd who went there was mixed, apparently made people uncomfortable. We're willing to listen to arguments that the theater's tiny screening rooms and uncomfortable seats aren't worth saving, but in a city that's underserved by multiplexes as it is, losing the only one that's not in Northwest doesn't seem like something worth celebrating to us.
Zanzibar Gets Nightclub Approval: More development angst from the WaPo, this time down on the Waterfront, where Zanzibar has won approval to become a nightclub after nearly losing its liquor license recently. Residents are, predictably, upset that their neighborhood is becoming home to most of the city's enormous nightclubs.
Briefly Noted: One man killed in triple shooting at Northeast playground ... Two 92-year-olds killed in car crash in Silver Spring ... Fairfax Connector service limited due to strike ... District to pay $1.7 million to resolve grant misuse allegation.
Photo by Aziz Y.
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Tiny Fey nail Sarah Palin or Tina Fey nailing Sara Palin is going to make this morning a little more constricting and distracting.
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That's the last time I buy lemonade from a dog. Yuck.
Waitaminit. You mean around the corner, fudge is made? Oh, I love fudge! Can I have some?
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Eh, Zanzibar's slated to get torn down like the rest of the waterfront whenever the developer finally gets the go-ahead to redevelop that area. Knowing DC that will happen approximately 5 years after it was supposed to start, during 3 of which the buildings will stand empty as slowly decaying husks, not producing any tax revenue and generally being a blight on the neighborhood, depressing sales at the fish market because all of the parking will likewise be blocked off. Not that those of us in SW aren't used to that at this point (Waterfront mall, anyone?).
I do feel sorry for the folks who live on the boats behind the nightclub, though (which is what it is and has always been - this license shift merely reflects reality instead of the wishes of the nearby residents), since Z can get a wee bit loud on the weekends.
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Union Station is just barely in NE; it's not exatly in the middle of Brookland. If you're coming by subway or bus, you might as well stay on for a few more stops and go to Gallery Place.
Although I have to say, the seats at Union Station aren't that bad. I think they've been somewhat recently upgraded.
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Man.... Union Station was the best theater to go to as a white person to enjoy the "black people at a scary movie" experience. That same affluence meets poverty lament from the WaPo writer is what makes that theater special.
It will be missed.
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I'll admit that I haven't been to the Union Station movie theater for a few years, but that was always my favorite place to see a "talking at the screen" movie.
You know, the type of show where everyone just has to be yelling, "No, NO! Don't go in there, baby!! NO! NO, BABY! DON'T. GO. IN. THERE! AWWWWWW, NO!! What did I just tell you?!? And you HAD to GO IN?!!??"
Ah, good times. Where will the next generation go to yell at screen actors who cant' hear them?
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The last time I was at the Union Station theater was in 2001 when I saw "Pearl Harbor." In the middle of the movie, some african-american guy in the audience starts berating and screaming uncontrollably at an eldery asian guy for no reason.....was very strange. At least back then, the theater was pretty dirty and just dumpy...not sad to see it go.
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maybe they can build a new theater that's actually in another part of the city FAR from northwest, like at skyland when that's rebuilt (is that ever really going to happen?)
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majapa: KNWIM? Jinx.
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The theaters in Union Station are the worst in the northern hemisphere. You'd find better service, food, and clientele watching snuff movies in Kosovo basements. If I wanted to sit in a cesspool surrounded by idiots yelling at the screen, I'd spend more time in mental hospitals being lobotomized by Nurse Ratched. Dig it up and sow salt so no theaters ever grow there again, please.
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I'm glad to see the Union Station theatres go too. It seemed like it was a refuge for kids ditching school and tourists with nothing to do on rainy days. I live just 5 blocks away, and sometimes stop by for a movie on my way home from work--but every visit I would find on different occurences:
1)vomit in the aisle. It really sucks when you can smell barf, but you are not sure where its at because it's in the dark.
2)obnoxious teens. damn--I feel old for saying that, but I don't like M&M's being thrown at the back of my head.
3)nasty bathrooms.
The Gallery Place theatres take care of #1 and #3 at least--and I have not seen projectiles thrown yet.
We probably could have had an additional indie theatre or two in this City if CVS had not bought up all of old movie theatres in town (I am especially thinking of Brookland, of which the neigborhood laments their old art deco venue being turned into a drug store).
Good riddance Union Station 9.
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Zanzibar wasn't already a nightclub? Could have fooled me. As a counterpoint to the anecdote in the article, I lived across from Waterfront Metro for 2 years and never had any issue with the clubs there. Obviously that's not as close as someone living on the water.
Did anyone else find the Post article awfully vague? It's written as if the whole community is against this, but there are only two residents quoted, one of whom is the ANC. The other admits he goes to Zanibar, and his actual position on the license change is not made clear in the article (it only says he spoke at the meeting). It doesn't say how many people were at the meeting, etc..
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I think it's completely unfair that DC's other three quadrants have to bear the burden of nighclub shootings. When will Southwest step up to the plate and claim their fair share? It's bad enough they don't allow shootings at H20 anymore. I mean, ever since they closed Ibex and Coach and Four, I have to drive all the way out to Northeast playgrounds if I want to shoot somebody. What's next? Do I have to go to Forestville and Suitland to get my thug on? I thought downtown was supposed to be "hip" and "vibrant?" Well, nothing vibrates more than a Glock being emptied into a moving vehicle.
Shame on you, Southwest Waterfront.
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I don't go to the movies much so I'm mostly ambivalent about the closing of the Union Station 9 theater. But one thing that folks cheering the demise US9 don't seem to be considering is that the obnoxious kids and homeless people who used to frequent that theater are now going to go elsewhere for the cinema experience.
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come on, true blood isn't THAT bad. i thought it was bad last week but i thought this week was a bit better...wasn't it? I want to like it.
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Can anyone recommend a theater, downtown or otherwise, that doesn't have obnoxious kids, wailing infants, and stinky people? Because the cellphone tweens and three-month-old screamers and the bikers coming back from a ride along the Potomac are what drove me to buying a front projector and a 120" screen in the first place.
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No mention of the passing* of David Foster Wallace**?
*He hanged himself.
**That guy who wrote Infinite Fest and has a severe footnote fetish.
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My thoughts exactly, hillrat.
Also, it almost seems that the people who are happy to see the closure of that theater have been forced to attend it all these years.
If you don't enjoy your experience their (and I agree, it doesn't sound very enjoyable,) simply go to another theater.
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Union Station theaters were great for movies where you wanted running audience commentary during a film. It sucked for anything other than that. The obnoxious kids and the homeless guys made that theater a disaster. They'll now probably just go over to the Chinatown/Gallery Place movie theater and do the same thing there.
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Monkey: Your best bet is the White House screening room. Just avoid the front row; even when Dick Cheney's not there they still can't get the old man smell out of the seats.
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DFW wasn't really a DC writer. You know that if Gore Vidal or Phyllis Richman hanged themselves, you'd get a blurb on dcist. And judging by the titles of some of her books, homoerotic asphyxiation is something she may want to consider exploring. For research purposes only, of course.
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No way in hell you're getting me in a dark room with "Big" Dick Cheney. The smell is the least of your problems, particularly after he's been watching women's volleyball.
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blittle: infinite jest.
maybe we can get that feature that some blogs have where, once you've posted your comment, you have a couple minutes to edit it, when you realize you've misspoken.
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Marc Fisher telling the people of NE/SE what's best for them again. What a f*cking knob.
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@IMGoph
That feature would be fonderful!
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Kudos to Fey for really working on that accent -- her Palin is so much better than Poehler's Clinton. Best line of the sketch.
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Everyone involved in movies today--from the Hollywood execs that keep greenlighting the same tired, recycled, pooped-out nonsense, to the theaters that charge $12 for a tub of stale popcorn, to the jackasses that pay $15 for a ticket so they can throw Milk Duds and talk on their cellphones ("Hello? Wassup? Not much. Watchin a movie. What're you doin? Watchin a movie, too? Which one? Yeah? F**k! We're in the same theater! I'm in back throwing Milk Duds!")--they can all just f**k themselves with a white hot poker.
All this, and I still can't get anyone to read my transgender coming-of-age dramady spec script, "The YaYa Brotherhood of the Traveling American Menstrual Quilt." Looks like I have to go to Studio Canal in France again and do my Jerry Lewis impersonation. Thank you, America. Thank you so f***ing much.
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Maybe we should hold an Infinite Jest Fest, simultaneously honoring David Foster Wallce and making both of the above posts accurate.
...Or maybe I should get back to work.
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My best story from Union Station ever: at the very end of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," the really emotional part where the guy's dying and just wants to tell Michelle Yeoh that he loves her and always has, some guy stands up and yells "Hey! This whole movie's in Chinese! What's up with that???"
I have never gone to a movie there again.
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It's hard to beat seeing Spiderman at the Union Sta theaters.
"Get up Spiderman! Get up! Look out behind you spiderman! Get up!"
Oh that and the lady who brought a full garbage bag full of cans in and kept inexplicably rummaging around through it.
RIP US9
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I was there a year or so ago. An older man and woman were talking fairly loudly with each other throughout the movie. When one of the other patrons politely shushed them, the woman in the couple turned around and shouted, "Shut up, white bitch!" Everyone in the theater moved further away from them.
So, I won't miss that aspect, but I will miss having a theater blocks from my house. We definitely need a good, well-run, clean, modern theater there, or somewhere else in Northeast/Southeast.
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You've obviously never been to the theaters at Greenbelt Plaza. Now that is an interactive experience.
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It's times like these I really miss the old Biograph and the Key. And not just because they used to show classic '70s porn like Behind the Green Door, Tell Them Johnny Wadd is Here, and Piddler on the Roof. Never had any audience problems back there. Just half a dozen guys in trenchcoats totally focused on the movie. Not a whisper could be heard, just the soft pulse of rhythmic stroking. And people on the screen looked like real people back then, not fake-ass 12-year-old tranny boys with a bolt-on silcone rack and enough makeup to smother a nun. Ron Jeremy hadn't discovered the all-you-can-eat buffet at Shoneys yet. Annette Haven could still get work. All the women wore choker scarves, all the men had gay biker beards, and nobody shaved down there. Now, you're lucky to find a actress with a tastefully trimmed landing strip. Yes, we've heard the chimes at midnight, Master Shallow. I' faith, the days we have seen!
Now, get off my lawn.
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Where is the feature on the Terps triumph over the "spaced out" California team. Do you need more reporters. FREDTERP
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thank god for fredterp, i say. IMGOPH
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Anybody know any actual concrete plans for Union Station upgrades, now that the theaters are definitely gone for good?
Rumor has is Burnham Place (?), the giant development that will go up over the track air rights directly North of Union Station will include new theaters.
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On the Union Station theaters, I can remember that at one point during college that the theater was waving a metal detector wand over everyone who came to the theater. I think that at that point that we collectively decided to never go back.
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They should put the condos underground and put a drive in theater over the tracks. That way, the a**holes can talk to the screen and their cellphones and bang the s**t out of eachother and the rest of us can watch The Bloodening in peace.
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The only one not in Northwest? Technically true, if you count that half block walk from North Capitol. And also, it's seven blocks from Gallery Place. Kind of a weak argument.
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Boomhauer,
Did you decide not to go back because you refuse to see a movie where people in the audience aren't allowed to bring in weapons? If so, I agree with you.
Westerns are way more fun when you can shoot back at the screen.